


What To Think

by birdbrains



Series: Old ERF [3]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: M/M, Paralysis, UST, bad dancing, deep conditioned triggers, disability feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-13
Updated: 2015-01-13
Packaged: 2018-03-07 10:06:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,918
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3170843
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/birdbrains/pseuds/birdbrains
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Was this part of a joke? Steve crouched down next to him and waved his fingers in front of Bucky's face, which was completely unresponsive. He could be faking--in fact, maybe it was the kind of thing he'd think was funny, to pretend one of his triggers had been set off by a stupid song. But Steve didn't think he was faking; he would have been smirking by now.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What To Think

Bucky had half-jokingly developed the idea that he was going to be a computer programmer, though he seemed to have little to no idea of what it entailed. Steve didn't know either. "No, listen to me," Bucky had insisted, "they make more money than God, they're _allowed_ to be weird and crazy, and I'm pretty sure they can work from home."

"Don't you want to go out and meet people?" Steve said.

"Of course I want to," Bucky said. He cut his eyes over at Sam, who was busy judging Steve and Bucky's silverware drawer. Bucky shouldn't have brought it up if he didn't want to talk about it, but Steve got the idea. "But liking to _see_ people doesn't mean I want to get up at fucking dark-thirty, or any time that somebody else tells me. Wouldn't you rather make your own schedule?"  

"No," Steve and Sam said.

"You were in the army but you don't know how to get up in the morning?" Sam asked.

"He's a mystery," Steve said. "Hey, what are you looking for in the silverware drawer?"

"Well, I'm _looking_ for a grapefruit spoon," said Sam, "but I'm not gonna find it. We need to talk about this." He pulled a handful of forks and knives out of the drawer. "You are the only people ever who keep your silverware in a weird pile instead of using an organizer, which would cost about two dollars. Fifty cents if you go to Thrift Town. This looks like a pirate's treasure chest except with no actual treasure and I can't find the grapefruit spoon, which is the reason I came over here in the first place."

"So you would leave if you found it," Bucky said. "We wanted to see you."

"Cute," Sam said. "Look, I'll _bring_ you an organizer."

"Won't use it," Steve said. "We like having to search for stuff. It makes us feel like pirates."

"Oh, because your life is so boring and uneventful."

"It's _fun_ ," Bucky said.

"Show some hospitality," said Sam.

"Then treat us like your friends and not grapefruit spoon dispensers," Bucky said. "You're objectifying us. But I'll find it." He went over to the drawer and there was a lot of clanking around as he rummaged around with his left hand, which soon emerged bearing the grapefruit spoon. "Did I mention this thing is a metal detector?"

"You don't know what objectify means," Sam said. He took the grapefruit spoon and no matter how much Steve and Bucky asked him, he never returned it.

/// 

Even though Steve's analogy was terrible, it seemed like the three dicks and hugging conversation had calmed Bucky down. Maybe Bucky was now attributing Steve's reluctance to the virgin thing--Steve hadn't played it up on purpose but it was pretty hard to hide how nervous and flat-out crazy he felt about the idea of Bucky touching him. He would have been nervous about anyone--but he would have been able to hide it, and that's what he would have done to make it easier. The mix of nervousness and complete awed fizziness--something he'd only felt about two people--was something he had no poker face for. 

So he was right--Bucky'd been more just offended than he'd been disappointed because he wanted to do it. Sometimes Steve couldn't help wondering if Bucky even wanted to do it at all. He was really set on treating things lightly, on things being the same. How could you even tell what you wanted when you were that focused on an ideal of what you should want? Steve knew people were different but he couldn't imagine just wanting to jump into sex when your last experience with it involved being mutilated to drive the interest out of you.

He'd bought himself time to think about it, anyway, and until then things happened that he really enjoyed but felt mildly guilty about. They hugged and put their feet on each other's knees when they were watching movies and a few times, when Steve said something clever, Bucky kissed him on the cheek or the top of the head. Steve wasn't sure what to make of that. It had happened sometimes when they were younger, but mostly Bucky had done it to his little sisters. For all his compunctions, Steve couldn't think of anything worse than Bucky seeing him as a little sister.

Steve panicked a little when Bucky started saying, "I'm going to teach you how to dance, Steve!" Even though it was something Bucky had tried a hundred times before, it just wasn't going to be the same now and the idea of Bucky holding on to his shoulder or his waist or his hand--and holding on to Bucky those places--just seemed like the minefield of the century.

But it turned out there wasn't so much contact in the new styles of dancing. Bucky said, "Look, I was watching TV and it's obvious it's a lot easier. Practically anything is dancing. You just have to move back and forth with the music and kind of grab your hair and stick your hips out." Steve couldn't help noticing that Bucky sounded a little offended; then Bucky did sigh, and he said, "It's a pretty pathetic excuse for dancing, but the point is, you woke up at the right time because you're a pretty pathetic dancer."

Steve thought Bucky was going to demonstrate some dance moves, but instead he just leaned against the wall and stared at him. He had put in a CD of dance music that Sam, the traitor, had made for this exact purpose.

"Well?" Bucky said when Steve just leaned against the opposite wall and looked back at him and started doing an imitation of Bucky's affected slouch. Bucky never had trouble standing up straight--he just wanted to look nonchalant.

"I don't know what you want me to do," Steve said. At least the music was familiar--he had heard some of it on the radio, and most of it from Sam or with other friends. If Bucky wasn't staring at him like a creep maybe he could have swayed or tapped his fingers a little, but that was a no go; he felt like a butterfly under glass and had just as much freedom of movement.

Bucky sighed and charged over to him. Steve flinched a little at the sudden movement--he _hated_ that he had that reaction--but "Never mind, it's my fault" was all Bucky said, and he shook it off and said, "Here. Feel this. I promise I won't be handsy." Then he put his hands on Steve's shoulders and just stroked out from there to his fingers. It was true, it didn't feel like handsiness; Bucky had the studiedly friendly, half-distracted look he'd used to have when Steve was really sick.  Most of the times that happened, they weren't living together and so Bucky had to come over to take care of him--or rather, he decided to, and Steve would be poised to start yelling at him as soon as the door opened.

If Bucky hadn't been so good at the distracted look, then the yelling would have happened. He didn't need to be there, he was wasting his time--Steve would manage it on his own, or if he couldn’t get through it on his own, maybe he didn’t deserve to. (It was the kind of self-pity that you convince yourself is self-sacrificing.) If Bucky had seemed nervous, or tender, when he was changing the sheets or coaxing Steve into eating and drinking and taking medicine, Steve would have just up and strangled him under the power of his own embarrassment. But Bucky wasn’t like that; it must have taken effort, but he made it seem like it was so boring he couldn’t even remember it was happening.

Sometimes Bucky would rub his back--that was one thing he remembered especially, when he was older and sillier, though there was nothing sexual about it at the time. It was just that his back was already all tied in knots, and the ache of sickness on top of it really got on his nerves. Like most of Steve's pains it wasn't the kind of thing that would make you shout, and he figured it wouldn't bother him so much if it didn't last so long. But instead it lasted, and it stacked on top of all the other things that weren't all that bad but lasted, and he didn't realize how much it was frustrating him until Bucky made it a little better.

He'd lie on his stomach and turn his face from the pillow and try his best to get it together to say that Bucky didn't need to do this. It wasn't like Steve was going to die from his back hurting. Besides--although it wasn't like he would have said this--part of him felt guilty somehow about being touched, especially on one of the more screwed up parts of his body. It couldn't be pleasant to look at or feel, it was all crooked, and it made him half thankful he never got anywhere with girls.

But the reasons he should tell Bucky to stop were also the reasons he so didn't want it to stop. It wasn't necessary, it was a waste of time, he'd probably go back to hurting within half an hour--but the frivolity of that kind of thrilled him. There was something addictive about feeling like you were important enough to get relief just for the sake of it. Part of him would want to let go of his awareness of how his body looked, and just feel better. 

But he couldn't, so he'd turn his head and be about to tell Bucky it was fine to stop, he was already feeling better. And Bucky wouldn't even be looking at him--he'd have his eyes fixed lackadaisically on something above him, maybe the weird white shadow on the wall where a picture used to be. Before Steve could start talking Bucky would start up talking himself, telling Steve some story that Bucky claimed was crazy but which half the time was usually pretty boring except for the way Bucky inserted a bunch of commentary like "you're not gonna believe this," like Steve's hair was going to turn white from shock just because Bucky's sister's cat had left a mouse head on the kitchen table. Steve would be following the dumb story, waiting for Bucky to pause more than a millisecond so Steve could point out how dumb it was, and then Bucky would say "That okay?" while doing something that felt like heaven, and Steve would say "Yeah," and Bucky would keep telling the awful excuse for a story. It would take a while for Steve to realize that he'd never asked Bucky to stop, that he'd forgotten now to even focus on asking. 

It was a little like that now. Bucky wasn't telling a story, but he was making it feel normal and not something to pay attention to, the way he ran his hands down Steve's arms, along his hands and fingers, then up to his jaw and down across his neck and shoulders, then very lightly from his waist down over his hips. It didn't feel sexual but it did feel like something, like a little streak of color was zooming along those lines.

"What's this?" Steve asked.

"Here's what," Bucky said. "Anyone who's seen you fight knows you should be able to dance. You're not clumsy. You're seamless. There's no reason to feel like you don't know how to let go of everything and move."

"Really," Steve said.

"Yes," Bucky said. "It's fun, you know. I just want you to try it."

"And it's going to work out as well as all the other times you said that to me."

Bucky laughed, pretty happy. "Come on, this is a really good song starting. Sam knows what you need." Steve didn't move and Bucky looked at him sternly. "Fine, okay. Just start with your arms, like this." He started waving his arms around, which should have looked stupid, but instead it looked smart on him, like he was made of water. Steve flailed his arms around sarcastically. Bucky laughed. "Okay, okay." He put his arms down and stood still except for his hips, which he swayed back and forth, with the rest of him slowly following. Again, he looked ridiculously dignified for someone doing something stupid, and he must have realized this, because he suddenly stepped about a yard back from Steve and did a backflip. When he landed on his feet he started dancing as bizarrely as possible, throwing out his arms one after the other, pelvic thrusting, and using the soles of his sneakers to slide along the carpet instead of lifting up his feet. He shimmied around the room making ugly faces and said, "Okay, you have to admit you could at least do this." 

"Could, won't," Steve said. "I have my pride." But he was feeling like he was pretty close to getting pulled into this; and he had a sense that, when he did break, it was going to be a nice feeling.

"No, you don't have your pride," Bucky said cheerfully and then, as another song started, he burst out laughing. "Oh, damn. We really shouldn't be listening to this."

"What? What's wrong with it?" Steve had maybe heard the song in the background somewhere, but he didn't know it well. Bucky was covering his mouth with his right hand, still laughing. 

"I can't believe you don't remember!"

"Remember what?" Steve didn't have a bad memory, and they'd been living together for less than six months. He didn't think they could have had a whole joke about a song that was barely familiar to him now. Meanwhile, Bucky was actually wiping the tears from his eyes because something about it had struck him as so funny. "Buck, I honestly barely know this song. Why are you laughing?" 

Bucky looked perplexed. "You really don't know?"

"Yeah. I don't know it." 

Bucky shrugged; his mouth twisted a little. "I don't actually know either," he said. "There's just something--I was hoping you could explain what it was." It bothered Steve that Bucky would try to trick him instead of just admitting that he was confused sometimes. For once he might actually confront him about it, he thought. Then the chorus kicked in and Bucky keeled over and fell on the floor, where he lay completely motionless.

Was this part of a joke? Steve crouched down next to him and waved his fingers in front of Bucky's face, which was completely unresponsive. He could be faking--in fact, maybe it was the kind of thing he'd think was funny, to pretend one of his triggers had been set off by a stupid song. But Steve didn't think he was faking; he would have been smirking by now. Bucky just lay there with his muscles relaxed and his face completely blank. 

"Blink if you can hear me," Steve said. Bucky didn't blink. " _Can_ you blink, Buck?" Now that Steve looked for it, it seemed like he wasn't blinking at all. Steve faked like he was going to hit him in the eye; he still didn't blink. "Sorry." Then he thought about how people need to blink to keep their eyes hydrated, so he closed Bucky's eyelids with his fingers and explained why.

Maybe something was medically wrong, but it seemed more likely that it was the paralysis trigger Bucky had mentioned earlier, and that he had recognized the song that contained it as something threatening without understanding why. His brain had tried slotting it into something normal, something he and Steve shared, the same as it had with the handler thing. 

"So, we know why you shouldn't listen to that song, huh?" Steve said. Then he wondered if he shouldn't have closed Bucky's eyes. He hadn't mentioned whether he remained conscious during the paralysis trigger, but he hadn't said he didn't, either. Steve had to assume the worst--that Bucky was fully conscious and having to just lie there unable to see what was going on. He reached down and opened Bucky's eyes again. "Sorry." He realized he'd better try to stay right in front of Bucky's face, where his eyes were focused, since they couldn't track. 

"So, I don't know how long you're going to be like this. I don't want you to be bored or scared." A different annoying song was starting and Steve got up and turned off the CD player. "I guess you can hear me." Again, it seemed better to be wrong about that than to just leave Bucky with no distractions. Steve pulled Bucky into a standing position and lugged him over to the couch, where he sat him down. "I guess we could watch TV," he said. But it didn't seem that Bucky liked most modern TV, and they didn't have any movies that they hadn't watched in a while.

Steve tried to think of an interesting story he could tell Bucky, but Bucky already knew most of them. He had had a very confusing conversation with Natasha the last time he saw her, but Bucky didn't much like Natasha. He denied not liking her and refused to talk about it, but Steve thought it was because he couldn't pull the wool over her eyes like he did with Sam.

"Thanks for trying to teach me to dance," Steve said. "I hate it, but thanks." It was sort of true, too, that it didn't make sense for Steve to be unable to dance. Maybe it hadn't made sense even before the serum. It was just that because he grew up with his body being such a disappointment, the idea of feeling certain things like music in it didn't exactly make sense to him. His body wasn't for fun; it was just an unfortunate storage facility for his mind.

"Hey, Bucky, want to see me dance?" Steve said. He positioned himself in the narrow corridor of space between the couch and the turned-off TV. He started singing a song that they best knew in the version by Helen Kane. Bucky would have tried to do an imitation of Helen's weird squeaky voice, and failed, and the failure would have been funny; Steve was pretending to have his pride, so instead he sang it in as big and booming a voice as possible, which hopefully was also funny.

Actually, Steve was sure it was pretty funny; if Bucky had been faking his paralysis, this was the moment when he wouldn't have been able to keep it going anymore. But he was unsmiling, as blank as a doll and almost featureless because of it. It was strange to realize how much of what Steve thought of as Bucky's face included his expressions. Even the Soldier had had them, as changed as he'd been. 

Steve walked sideways back and forth across the room in front of Bucky, wiggling his shoulders around and flapping his hands. Then in the interest of following Bucky's instructions, he started grabbing his hair with his hands and pulling it up into points. Bucky would just have to accept he wasn't moving his hips--it was too hard to do that when he was also walking and singing.

He couldn't imagine a single person in the world who wouldn't see this and think he was dangerously unstable. His dancing was bad enough, but he was doing it while his best friend was literally as limp as a dishrag, so limp that Steve had had to prop and barricade him with pillows to keep him in a sitting position. Tony Stark had doctors who were not as bad at treating supersoldiers as other doctors might have been. Imagine if Steve was responsible enough to call them instead of assuming the situation was what he thought it was.

He was sure he was right, though, and he was sure there was nothing Bucky would hate more than to be paraded in front of doctors when he was like this. He didn't even want Sam, his actual friend, to know about the deep conditioning triggers. Honestly he seemed to wish even Steve didn't see them. Bucky had said they all had time limits. Steve just had to wait and keep both of them from going crazy in the meantime.

He cycled through a few more songs before he realized that walking side to side was kind of stupid, since Bucky couldn't track him. He was tired of it anyway. "It was a little fun, jerk," he admitted before going over to the bookcase and pulling out one of Bucky's modern sci-fi books. "That Heinlein guy has too much sex in his books," he fussed, since he thought that would make Bucky smile if he could smile. "Did they ever make you fight aliens? You never mentioned it. I bet you'd have liked it, if you could like things."

He sat next to Bucky and opened to the bookmark. He read the book out loud for a while. It was weird. He didn't think Bucky's pulp magazines had been this weird when they were younger, at least not in the same way. He couldn't help adding his own comments and questions to the things he was reading. "I hope it's not too annoying. Well, at least women are allowed to talk in this book."

He read for what felt like a long time before saying, "Shit! I guess I should have been timing how long you've been paralyzed. Shit, I hope you're paralyzed. I'm going to feel like such an asshole if you're having a serious medical problem. I wish you could tell me. I'm going to give it a few more hours, pal, okay? Then I probably will call the doctor.

"Anyway," he continued, "I'm losing my voice, but it should heal up soon. I'm just gonna turn on the TV for now--I know you don't like most of it, but I don't want you to be bored."

He leaned forward to pick up the remote, then turned on TV and settled back on the couch with Bucky. He put the bookmark in the book and continued reading on to himself. It wasn't his thing, but he should try to be up on the things Bucky was reading. Maybe he could ruin the ending for him. After a while it wasn't so bad; he could get into the book easier now than he'd been able to when he was reading out loud. He could read faster and skim over the stupid parts.

He had finished the book and was about to go back and read the beginning when Bucky picked the remote up off Steve's lap and turned off the TV. "You know I hate that stuff," he said.

"Well, I was losing my voice," Steve said. "What are we supposed to do if both of us can't talk? What if someone calls us?"

"As if anyone would call _you_ , loser," Bucky said. "You could have danced some more! I liked that." 

"Oh, my wonderful dancing," Steve said, looking at him sternly until Bucky pulled his hand up to his face and giggled behind it.

"I did like it," he said when he was done giggling at Steve's misfortune. "You're very creative." He added, thoughtfully, "Asshole."

**Author's Note:**

> Oh my gosh I am so embarrassed because I JUST realized that Heinlein was already a published writer before Stucky died. I mean, I didn't flat-out say otherwise, but I was thinking that he was writing from the 50s-80s and so Steve would adorably think of him as modern because it was after 1944. But I was wrong. Why didn't I check Wikipedia before posting instead of after.
> 
> I'm going to finagle my way out of this in future drafts. What if Bucky really was enjoying Heinlein's early stories in all the awesomely titled magazines (THRILLING WONDER STORIES! SUPER SCIENCE STORIES!) and then in 2014 he was, like, "WHAT! He has like 50 more books now that I can read!" He would be so happy.


End file.
